Hizo story hata Zumaridi anatusimulia
Outwitting the Grim Reaper – John's tale
The Raising of Lazarus
"The name Lazarus, in the same abbreviated form La'zar (for El'azar, Eleazar) which we find in the Gospels, is quite common on the ossuaries."
– W. F. Albright, The Archaeology of Palestine, p244.
The most famous of JC's "raisings" is the one reported by
John. It is the most detailed and dramatic – which makes it all the more curious that it goes unrecorded in any of the synoptic gospels. But then, in a sense, it does appear, not as a miracle but as
parable. A complex web is woven in which the threads are a place (Bethany), two sisters (Mary and Martha), a Simon, a jar of expensive ointment, Jesus' feet, a corpse and a return to life.
Early in
Luke, after the incident at Nain and an exchange of messages with John the Baptist,
Simon the Pharisee invites Jesus to dinner. As he eats, an unnamed prostitute "
stood at his feet behind him" (!) and in some curious contortion manages to wash his feet with her tears, wipe them with her hair, and anoint them with ointment from an alabaster box. JC uses the occasion to pontificate on degrees of sin and love. (Luke 7.36,40).
A little later in
Luke, JC finds himself in "a certain village" with "a certain woman" named Martha and a sister called Mary. To Martha's chagrin, Mary, rather than help with the dishes, "
sat at Jesus' feet" to hear his words. The great man tells Martha to chill out, or words to that effect, declaring that Mary's action is "
the good part". (Luke 10.38,42).
Luke's final contribution comes in chapter 16. JC has wended his way "
through the cities and villages towards Jerusalem", telling a multitude of parables. One of the last he relates is the story of "
a certain rich man" and a sick beggar called Lazarus, who has fed on crumbs from the rich man's table. Both die, the beggar taken up to heaven, the rich man down to hell. The pleas from the rich man for Lazarus to cool his thirst are in vain.
It's payback time. The crunch line is delivered by JC:
"If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead."
– Luke 16.19,31.
In these words Jesus mouths a rebuttal to any suggestion that a reanimated corpse might be a good way to convince unbelievers of his mighty power. Belief must come from
scripture, not physical evidence.
This rather nicely gets the priests out of a hole. Luke's parable is the only reference to a Lazarus in any of the synoptic gospels and there is no suggestion that the two sisters might have a brother of that name.
Matthew (and
Mark) conflate
Luke's first
two stories into one. The village is now named as
Bethany and the house is that of
Simon the Leper. As Jesus eats, an unnamed woman anoints his head by pouring "
very precious ointment" from an alabaster box. The disciples protest at the waste (not to mention the mess) but JC declares that the woman has "
wrought a good work". (Matthew 26.3,13; Mark 14.1,9).
John's gospel now completes the wondrous yarn by weaving
all three of Luke's tales into one. Lazarus is no longer the hero of a parable but is the flesh-and-blood brother of Martha and Mary. The opening verses of chapter 11 make clear that the unnamed prostitute with such versatile hair that featured in
Luke 7 in fact is Mary of Bethany.
"Now a certain man was sick, named Lazarus, of Bethany, the town of Mary and her sister Martha. It was that Mary which anointed the Lord with ointment, and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick."
– John 11.1,2.
The sisters have not hitherto been mentioned in
John so clearly the writer is working from the other gospels. Apparently, Jesus
loves the whole family (note the emphasis
– but doesn't he love everybody?) – Lazarus "
he whom thou lovest", Martha and her sister "
Jesus loved". The sisters "sent unto him" (
does everybody have a servant?) but Jesus dallies. It seems he already knows Lazarus is sick but is unconcerned, events will all reflect "to his glory":
"When Jesus heard that, he said, This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God might be glorified thereby."
– John 11.4.
Where exactly is Jesus at this point? He has "escaped" out of Jerusalem and is beyond the Jordan "
where John first baptized."
John says in 1.28 that this is "
Bethabara" but no such place is known to history. Many Bibles "correct" this (confusingly) to read
Bethany to flow with the following verses
(well, it is all a fiction, after all!). After an affected delay Jesus deigns to visit his now dead friend, in his grave four days and "stinking". The motif of "four days" is chosen in deference to the Jewish notion that the soul hovers at the grave for
three days. Lazarus is
really dead.
Martha goes out to meet the approaching holy man and affirms her faith in both resurrection "at the last day" and Jesus as the Son of God. Inexplicitly Jesus again dallies, this time allowing Martha to "secretly" tell her sister Mary that "the Master" has called for her. Mary rushes out to fall at JC's feet (
love those feet!) and Jesus, who knows everything, asks where Lazarus is buried. The crowd of Jews who have gathered in sympathy question whether Jesus could have saved the life of his "loved friend" (
the one that we have never heard of before). Jesus groans and weeps.
At the cave where Lazarus is buried Jesus orders the removal of the stone door and very publicly prays, explaining his motive for this to God himself (
who surely knows everything?).
"Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always: but because of the people which stand by I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me."
– John 11.41,42.
Finally, Jesus shouts "
Lazarus, come out!" and the dead man emerges, grave clothes and all.
At this point, "Lazarus", loved friend and restored dead man, is all but entirely dropped from the story (
what? no tales from the grave?). Instead,
John's focus is back on JC and a repeat of the "costly ointment/hair wiping feet" scene from the synoptic gospels referred to briefly at verse 11.2. History is about to repeat itself.
But there is no possibility this could be a a second, similar instance.
John picks up the
precise value of the ointment ("spikenard") used at
Mark 14.4 ("
three hundred pence").
John reiterates
identical Jesus dialogue to justify his indulgence of costly ointment "
because the poor are always with you". And
John has Jesus issue the
same instruction to his disciples to "
Let her alone!" The only difference is that
John has shifted the indignation of the
disciples (
Matthew 26.8,
Mark 14.4) to
one disciple alone.
Judas Iscariot,
son of Simon (
the Pharisee or is that the Leper?!) has been fingered as the bad guy.
"Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her hair: and the house was filled with the odour of the ointment. Then saith one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, which should betray him, Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor? This he said, not that he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and had the bag, and bare what was put therein. Then said Jesus, Let her alone: against the day of my burying hath she kept this."
– John 12.3,7.
What are we to make of a "historical" event that both begins and ends at the same moment in "history", a pastiche of borrowed elements and recycled names? The answer is NO HISTORY AT ALL. The "raising of Lazarus" is as bogus as the flying pigs of Gadara and the birthing of a god from a Jewish virgin. The rehashed story does not even have its origins with fiction from the synoptic gospels but rather with a rabbinic tale of
Bar Majan the tax collector, itself copied from
Egyptian funeral texts of El-Azar, an ancient prototype for the Lazarus parable of judgement in the afterlife.
But then, why waste a good yarn?